NOW A MAJOR MOTION PICTURE
A British woman recalls coming of age during World War I in this unforgettable true story of young love, war, and how to make sense of the darkest times
‘Remains one of the most powerful and widely read war memoirs of all time’
Guardian
‘A haunting elegy for a lost generation’
The Times
‘Should be compulsory reading’
Daily Mail
In 1914 when war was declared, Vera Brittain was twenty, preparing to study at Oxford. Four years later her life – and the lives of her whole generation – had changed in a way that would have been unimaginable.
TESTAMENT OF YOUTH, one of the most famous autobiographies of the First World War, is Brittain’s account of how she survived those agonising years; how she lost the man she loved; how she nursed the wounded and how she emerged into an altered world.
A passionate record of a lost generation, it made Vera Brittain one of the best-loved writers of her time, and has lost none of its power to shock, move and enthral readers since its first publication in 1933.
With an afterword from Kate Mosse OBE.
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Reviews
it was a surprise to pick her book up now and discover how very good it is.
A heartbreaking account of the impact of the First World War on a stout-hearted, high-minded young woman
Like the much-misunderstood poppy, Testament both memorializes and warns... to remain uninformed is actually life-threatening.
Vera Brittain's heart-rending account of the way her generation's lives changed is still as shocking and moving as ever.
essential reading, not just as an anti-war polemic but as a portrait of a whole generation of young people who were totally ill-prepared and whose lives were utterly changed within four momentous years.
sublimely moving... this is a truly great book... should be compulsory reading for the nation's debauched and aimless yobs and yobettes
brilliantly captures the protracted horrors of a war into which her generation was preciptated unprepared... as a personal and social document of its turbulent times, written from the viewpoint of a serious and reflective young woman, this autobiographical work fully merits rediscovery.
Everyone should read this book. Like all true classics, it has something to tell us all, one generation after another. And this handsome new edition benefits from photographic illustrations and an elegant preface by Shirley Williams, Vera Brittain's distinguished daughter. If you have tears, prepare to share them now.